Thought Leadership and Blog Posts
Whether you’re launching a new product, revitalizing a legacy brand, or building an innovation pipeline from scratch, I have the know how from having successfully turned many great ideas into scalable, profitable products.
Clients turn to me when they need pragmatic creativity – someone who can connect big-picture thinking with operational detail to maximize product-market fit. I work at the intersection of strategy and execution, helping teams define clear value propositions, align roadmaps to business goals, and drive decisions grounded in both data and customer insight. Whether I’m leading a workshop, embedding with your team, or advising your executive leadership, I focus on outcomes: better products, faster launches, and stronger results.
Most businesses under $100 million don’t need a COO.
In fact, in many, if not most, cases a COO would slow down decision-making, add unnecessary cost, confuse reporting lines, and generally be a drag on the business.
But a Fractional or Interim COO like me, that’s a different story...
Most founders/CEOs of companies between $10M - $100M think their problems sit in one bucket: Sales, Manufacturing, Operations, People, Finance. But the truth? Those buckets are linked...
Most CPG founders only think they’ve made it when they reach $20M. But the real achievement isn’t $20M it’s $2M...
Scaling Without Bloat Requires an Owner Mindset A leader’s way of working is shaped by what brought them success in the past. Executives who come from large companies know how to lead managers, navigate complex org charts, and delegate through layers. They know how to manage complexity, policies...
For a CEO, leading a sub-$100M business is not a junior version of leading a $500M one - it's a completely different animal altogether. The difference isn't just in the simplicity of smaller companies-fewer product lines, leaner teams, and more straightforward go-to-market strategies - it's in the...
Mid-sized companies bring unique challenges. They’re too complex for simple solutions but too lean for big-company resources. Leaders must be scrappy and hands-on—able to both develop the right strategy, the know-how to implement change and consistency to deliver ongoing results...
Running a small or mid-sized business means wearing many hats. You move fast & make calls. But when it comes to marketing, speed and instinct aren’t enough. Marketing is different—it’s strategic, detail-driven, and requires consistent focus. That’s where a Fractional CMO can help...
Innovation captures headlines, but it’s business operations that determine whether those ideas scale—or stall. While everyone loves the energy of ideation, few are eager to dive into the mechanics of execution...
To thrive during an economic turbulence, companies must change their innovation strategy. Budgets must be cut while continuing to invest in innovation. The key is having a balance and making strategic shifts. This approach can help companies emerge as leaders...
When it comes to innovation, it might seem simple—just ask consumers what they want and how much they're willing to pay, right? But the reality is far more complex...
Despite steady growth, this company's founder was dissatisfied—not with the company’s success, but with the methods behind it. Captivated by the glamor and allure of breakthrough innovation, they redirected resources towards disruptive ideas they thought would capture headlines and venture capital...
Cash is king—or so the adage goes. But for many leaders, an influx of capital doesn’t improve their company, rather it accelerates their demise...
When it comes to innovation, most tools, processes and frameworks are prescriptive. They promise, in essence, if you’d just do it right, you’ll always be successful. Somehow despite this, 75% of companies still report that their innovation efforts are not meeting their expectations, 60% of product...
There is no doubt that AI will transform how innovators work, collaborate, and innovate. It will shape innovation itself both in terms of what is created and how it is practiced. AI is creating transformative opportunities for innovation leaders who must adapt quickly or risk being left behind...
Leaders are constantly faced with the need to initiate change from addressing small daily issues to capturing major strategic opportunities. They know the consequences of failing to make changes eventually compound – creating bigger problems down the road. Yet, many leaders will go to great lengths...
Daily routine meetings are often seen as a time sink with little to no value and can be one of the most disliked aspects of running a business. However, they may also be the most critical system for moving quickly, identifying and solving issues, and improving alignment between the company’s...
Profitability is the purpose of any business, yet many, both successful or struggling, are challenged to achieve the profits they should have.
Here are some strategies I use to enhance my clients’ profitability:...
Almost every booth at the 2024 Fancy Food Show claimed they offered something new, an innovation. But I found most were not more than incremental changes to existing products; new flavors, formats or packaging. However, a few booths did stand out to me as being both innovative and aligned with...
Speed is often touted as a critical factor for success, with businesses of all sizes striving to move swiftly to capitalize on opportunities, stay ahead of the competition and save money. However, there's a crucial nuance to this need for speed: it's not just about moving fast; it's about moving...
In the world of small businesses, sales performance, efficiencies, structure and product/market fit are keys to unlocking profitability and growth. Yet, many business owners and CEOs find themselves struggling to capture the profitability they believe their business should have. This is where the...
Advising against relying solely on consumer focus group feedback in the innovation process can seem counterintuitive at first glance. After all, customer insights are crucial for designing products or services that meet market and user needs. However, there are compelling reasons why researchers and...
Innovations have no value until they are launched. The most effective way to launch more, and better, innovations is to practice innovation portfolio optimization. The issue isn’t ”if” your company is practicing innovation portfolio management, it’s “how”...
CEO’s can F-up innovation both by denying NIH is an issue in their company, and by failing to embrace outside innovations in the innovation portfolio. ...
R&D and innovation management executives are always looking to implement best practices that improve their opportunity for success. However, many practices and ‘common-sense’ innovation management decisions don’t have any correlation with innovation success or failure...
Inflection points manifest in two primary forms: expansion or contraction. However, both signify the same reality; strategies that worked in the past may no longer suffice in the future. Successfully navigating through either type of inflection point is crucial for a business's survival.
While many...
Are innovation failures always as obvious in the moment as they are post-facto? Here’s a short list of some product launches that, on paper, had all the elements needed for success, but were total failures none the less. I’m not listing head-scratching new products like Juicero, but...
A primary reason I see many small businesses fail to grow, or even fail completely, is the reluctance of their founders to embrace sales as the most critical function for their success...
The first step in launching a successful new product is to avoid the common traps that nearly guarantee failure.
Leaders need to ask themselves why failed products were launched in the first place. How did leaders NOT see that some products were certain to fail...
Making any decision about innovation is extremely challenging. Leaders are frequently confronted with the need to make definitive choices in situations where the potential outcomes are, at best, unclear.
To achieve success in innovation, leaders must adhere to these three fundamental rules when...
Innovation is fundamentally about challenging the status quo.
Challenging assumptions and decisions is critical to avoid one of the 9 ways leaders fail by innovation: Innovating for themselves...
It is important to distinguish between being a micro-manager and being a micro-decider. One builds engagement and accountability, the other can be highly detrimental...
The real business value of innovation comes from improving processes that lead to systematic efficiency, cost savings, and competitive advantages...
Innovation is one of the more important challenges for a CEO. But, it is unlike any other business function they lead...
Growing a business from niche to mainstream requires a unique approach to brand and product development; one of assimilation instead of innovation. In general, a niche product is successful because 1) It has a feature or attribute can’t be found in...
Marketing a new product is always a challenge. Marketing a new to this world multipart system, like a “Keurig” for cocktails, water, ice cream, etc. is exponentially more difficult. These pod-based systems require consumer education, explanations of the value proposition, translations of technical...
Developing adjacent businesses is another way of saying you’re committing to doing the same thing as before. Building a growth strategy based on category adjacencies sounds like a great idea. Adjacencies are intended to leverage your company’s existing infrastructure, know-how, brands and route to...
There is a false mystique around innovation. Designers, engineers and consultants espouse that it must be experienced first-hand, requires talent and cannot be taught. However, innovation is a business function with the same inputs, KPIs and outputs as any other. It makes innovation management a...
The saying is ‘Hardware is hard’, but it isn’t really. Companies continuously strategize, develop and launch successful new products in every category in existence. This can only happen if the skills, process and tools to innovate are widespread and mastered by many. Ever since my first foray in...
Simplicity can be a competitive advantage. But can established companies leverage simplicity or does it need to be a fundamental principle?...
When large companies need to solve a consumer problem often the fastest route to market, with the lowest risk, is to buy a company that already has a solution. However, when consumer behavior has changed rapidly and getting to market with the right solution is critical, I believe building innovation...
Corporate innovation teams are money losers because innovation teams are not using analytical simulations to make investment decisions the way fund managers do...
What confidence do you have in decisions for an innovation that will launch into a market undergoing such dynamic change? How do you create alignment to act when investing in innovation is even more risky than normally?...
Giving innovation teams more learning cycles increases new product adoption by enabling a larger range of concepts to be tested for best product-market fit...
Many companies are reducing their innovation costs as they see sales declines and are laying people off. The COVID crisis, like every one before, is creating significant and long-lasting changes to our everyday lives...
Before any function can be created it needs a definition of its purpose, a Mission Statement. The Mission Statement Statement must clearly communicates what it is going to do, defines success, and sets limits to its scope...
Everyone thinks the greatest risk of innovating are either coming up with a great idea, solving technical challenges, or overcoming the challenges of manufacturing. Not to discount them, these issues are tough to overcome the first few times. Of course, through experience companies can become expert...
There’s always been a stream of thought that believes consumer research should be ignored, or maybe not conducted at all. Without a doubt, the results from consumer research can be wrong, misleading, or worse, make company risk-averse and their products mediocre. I have product successes that went...
There’s always been a stream of thought that because Steve Jobs didn't conduct consumer research the average customer can't describe the future until it's created. Without a doubt, the results from consumer research can be wrong, misleading, or worse, make company risk-averse and their products...
For as long as someone has created a breakthrough innovation there was a process proposed for replicating their success. But three innovation systems stand out to me because I’ve found that they are especially effective when used in combination. Using these tools I recently launched a breakthrough...
My company transitioned from a classic waterfall to Agile for a three important reasons. 1) Prioritizaion and focus, 2) Transparency and communications and 3) Team development...
I've spent the last three years adopting Agile / Scrum to hardware. Agile's promise of twice the work in half the time can be achieved. But, the version of Agile I evolved to required thinking beyond the limited precepts of the Agile Manifesto...